If we're going to put so much effort into framing questions in the right way then it follows that we should be equally concerned with really listening to the responses we get...

We know that coaches have a healthy attitude towards other people and this is demonstrated by the three main things they do in their coaching sessions...

We cannot prove human nature; we can only form our own view. One of the most accessible pieces of theory on this point was provided by McGregor when he described the idea that managers view their people in two main categories...

We all have a variety of aims in every aspect of our lives. We might aim to be effective parents or good managers, or we might aim to lose weight or achieve a certain level of income...

A long time ago in an organization far, far, away...

The big prize is improved performance. Both the improved performance of a well-coached team and your own performance as their boss...

The most obvious way in which the people you coach benefit from the coaching you do is in an improved level of performance. If they are sales people, they'll sell more. If they are themselves managers, they'll manage better. If they are administrators, they'll become better at administrating...

All organizations are concerned with performance. Where the profit making enterprise will concentrate on the bottom line and creating value for its shareholders, the public organization will need to provide value for the communities it serves; who fund it in one way or another via taxation...

It has been said that people join organizations but leave managers and there is probably a lot of truth in this. Listen to the conversations in coffee shops and bars where workers gather at lunchtime and take note of their moans and groans...

When I train managers as coaches I always warn them to respect the power of coaching questions and to recognize the possibility that what starts as an innocuous, business related conversation, may lead to the unveiling of a deeper issue...

Most managers I train as coaches are clear (or have been convinced by their bosses) that they need to take on the role of coach as part of their people management responsibilities...

Managers need to know their team well enough to be able to decide who should do what, and they must never seek to delegate accountability...

So how does all this relate to coaching and where would we place coaching on the spectrum...

Coaching managers would be advised to develop at least a little insight into the signs of abnormal psychology...

The term eating disorder can apply to a variety of conditions but here we'll consider two of the better known: Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa...

In this module we looked at phobias and the anxiety response they can produce in their sufferers...

How many psychologists does it take to change a light bulb? Only one, but the light must really want to change...

It is a popular misconception that schizophrenia means a split personality. This is not true...

If you want to see an immediate boost in levels of motivation, fire up your word processor and create a quick questionnaire for each of your team members...

Let's develop our understanding of coaching by considering how it compares with other ways of developing people.

It is widely agreed that coaching is a much-misunderstood concept and it is perhaps not surprising that many myths have sprung up around the subject.

Many of the managers I train as coaches tell me they have a "friend" who finds speaking in public and making presentations difficult...

Imagine I was coaching you on something as straightforward as catching a ball...

I've heard it said that apart from the spelling there is no difference between coaching and counselling...

It is difficult to decide on a single definition of the word management and this is not helped by the modern trend in organizations to label almost everything and everybody as management in some way...

More fuss has been made about the distinction between coaching and mentoring than most other facets of coaching put together...

Whilst I won't pretend that they are direct quotes, these senior management style comments do serve to illustrate the foggy understanding of the differences between training and coaching and suggest some of the difficulties that might be encountered in moving from one discipline to the other...

The relationship you have with your boss is very important on both a professional and a personal level. It can have a significant influence on your day-to-day job satisfaction as well as your long-term career success...

Long before the credit crunch bit down upon us all, the world of work was changing at pace in any event...

Certainly in Britain - where I am based - there are research statistics showing differences in the prevalence rates for mental disorders between different ethnic or cultural groups...

Coaching draws on many different influences. For most people the word itself is connected with sporting activities and it is easy to understand how the relationship between performer and coach works in that setting...

Perhaps the most famous experiments in motivation took place at the Western Electric Company's Hawthorne plant in Chicago...

Taylor was an American engineer who achieved his qualifications the hard way, via evening studies...

Maybe you feel that learning about coaching and therefore improving your management skills will make you more secure in your current job or improve your CV and thus your employment prospects...

One of the key principles of successful coaching is to create an atmosphere of trust between coach and coachee.

These are difficult times. Commercial organisations are faced with empty order books, lack of cash or capital and shrinking markets. The public sector too is finding its resources shrinking as there is simply not the finance expected even a year ago.

We had learnt of some grant funding for training that a local business development agency was promoting* and were circulating details amongst our prospective clients...

Rapport in coaching is a question of getting on our coachee's wavelength; it's about appreciating how they see the world and adapting our communication style to match.

When you have a follow up coaching session with somebody you've worked with previously, it can be hard to pick up the flow. I like to use the Achievements, Issues, Plans model to help with this...

Jim works as a business adviser for a small consultancy. The consultancy has a contract from a government agency to supply advice, guidance and sometimes grant funding to start-up businesses...

My Coaching ARROW, the ubiquitous GROW model or any of the dozens of acronyms out there are often thought of and referred to as coaching models but this is a mistake...

Ask anyone to define the word coach and you will get a wide variety of responses. Some will say coach is a sort of tutor or instructor, but others will say it�s a large, multi-wheeled railway carriage. Unfortunately, the second definition is about as helpful as the first in deciding what coaching at work is all about...

The two main skills of coaching are undoubtedly the ability to ask probing questions and the capacity for active listening. This article looks at asking questions...

There is still some debate around whether coaches need a detailed knowledge of the matter in hand or underlying subject in order to be able to coach another person effectively...

Let's go into detail now on the factors that I believe make the case for coaching a compelling one.

There is now much more job mobility than was once the case and I don't just mean moving from one company to another...

If people are not performing to their potential something will be missing in terms of their own knowledge, skills or attitude. In other words, there will be a performance gap...

I've been involved in the crazy old world of work long enough to realize the massive difference between people performing because they "have to" and people performing because they "want to"...

We now need to help our coachees think through the various options they have in dealing with their issues and moving towards their aims...

It is increasingly being recognized that it may be possible for more than one personality to exist within the same individual...

The most important thing we must recognize as we coach people through the Reality stage is that it is all a matter of perception...

Fate is a strange thing. Despite my concentration on helping managers achieve results by learning to coach, the world of recruitment has started to invade my business life...

The reflection part of the coaching ARROW provides the person being coached - often called the coachee - with an opportunity to reflect on what's been discovered so far...

Alfred Kinsey is credited with bringing scientific research methods and objectivity to the field, whilst the groundbreaking work of Masters and Johnston in the 1970's precipitated the birth of the sex therapy industry...

I think I'm missing out. I'm guessing a lot of managers, who could benefit from developing good coaching skills, self-select and decide not to attend my training...

At one time we could expect to leave school, college or university with an education that would last our working life...

Despite the compelling reasons we might offer for introducing coaching we can expect to encounter many barriers. We need to understand what the barriers are and how we might help others develop their understanding of coaching so that these barriers may be removed...

Anyone with more than a passing interest in coaching is likely to be familiar with the concept of the Inner Game...

We worry about the 'transfer' of learning and we ponder how to take learning 'back' into the work situation. Coaching resolves the tension between learning and performing by making them part and parcel of the same thing...

With the appropriate skills, it is possible for any person to coach another. However we must also recognize that, as managers we have a host of other responsibilities to attend to and that some of these might make it difficult to coach as often or as effectively as we might like...

Picture the scene. There's an old man who lives by himself in a house at the end of a cul-de-sac. More than anything else in life this old man values his privacy and peace and quiet...

It has been said that there is no such thing as difficult employees, only ineffective managers, but I've yet to meet anyone who believes that's true...

This can seem an alarming list but I'm not suggesting that we all need to become psychotherapists, but even if you have to deal with such issues only once an awareness of what to look for and how to respond could be crucially helpful...

I recently had a conversation with a manger we were training as a coach who was concerned at the level of apathy and even hostility his coachees were displaying...

If we've coached well to this point we should begin to see a rise in energy levels of the people we coach as they realize that they are resourceful and can move their own issues forward and become excited at the prospect of doing so...

An appreciation of the similarities and differences between coaching and other people development approaches is useful when it comes to positioning coaching in your team and in your organization...

My little Collins English Dictionary defines the verb to coach as 'to instruct by private tutoring, to instruct and train, to act as a coach'...

I am often asked how long a coaching session should last and how often they should take place. I’m afraid that’s a question up there with how long is a piece of string?...

Coaching is not a panacea for all organisational ills and ought not be introduced to the organisation on the basis of a leap of faith...

As I’ve described elsewhere, coaching is a learnt skill and so regular coaching sessions will also be developmental for the coach as well as the coachee...